Even the self employed business passenger would just put it on expenses plus for your average seat it won't be very expensive at all. £3 as per the current trial.
In truth, many (by no means all) of our regular passengers prefer the free seating system and in the vast majority of cases the seating policy works. However, it does cause some travellers to be anxious/worried and it does detract from an otherwise good product. As i mentioned a few pages back, in some, albeit few, cases people won't book Easyjet because of that where as I don't believe people wouldn't fly EZY because they have allocated seating. So in essence it is designed first and foremost to improve the overall experience aswell as to mop up any passengers who wouldn't normally consider the airline because of the seating policy.
I think allocated seating is much better than speedy boarding so i think this is a good move by EasyJet. Speedy boarding is pointless if you are using a bus gate as they put on passengers with speedy boarding and without speedy bording on the same bus so therefore wasting money.
I'm pro allocated seating, always have been and never really championed the speedyboarding product. It's never really been needed from a pax point of view in my opinion, even though I am a Easyjet plus card holder.
However, there is no reason why the bussing of passengers should turn speedy boarding into a failure. A few airports, I'm sure don't grasp this but most do. You'll find SB's either have a separate bus or a cordoned off area. The problem with SB is more to do with passengers conduct in the terminal to be honest and even that can be solved if staff manage things correctly....and again many do.